We are reinvigorating what retirement means

[stillooking]

FFS we're contractors, why worry about the measly state pension. I'll be retiring at 50 anyway only 7 years to go !

Retiring at 50? That would be nice, but not feasible (for me)

[doodab]

Yep, well that's what happens if you send 50% of kids to university; you can't give them all proper student grants. Why not give full, decent student grants to 10 or 15% of young people, based purely on ability, and let the rest finance their own way through part time or OU courses, or simply get on the job training or an apprenticeship to do something useful? They could even join the forces, which provide excellent education for young people.

End the obsession with sending too many kids to university and you've solved the problem of student finances AND got people working for longer in one step.

Well yes, it's a valid point.

Personally I fear we've made the world too complicated that the average 16 - 18 year old can be that useful in the workplace though, and while apprenticeships are a possible solution to that problem the modern corporation (unsurprisingly) doesn't seem to keen on giving young people a free tertiary education only to have them leave for a higher paid job. In the days of state owned monopolies it was perhaps more viable because there was nowhere for them to go and they would repay the investment over many years.

[Mich the Tester]

I suspect the parents are finding the tuition fees eat up a lot of the money they had set aside so that little extra money is more important than you think, and there are a lot more people who aren't funded by mummy and daddy than there used to be.

Edit: I've no hard facts though, so if you can be bothered to dig some up that would be interesting.

Yep, well that's what happens if you send 50% of kids to university; you can't give them all proper student grants. Why not give full, decent student grants to 10 or 15% of young people, based purely on ability, and let the rest finance their own way through part time or OU courses, or simply get on the job training or an apprenticeship to do something useful? They could even join the forces, which provide excellent education for young people.

End the obsession with sending too many kids to university and you've solved the problem of student finances AND got people working for longer in one step.

[doodab]

Do they really? Most of them? OK, a few of them, but I think most students are middle class kids who are largely financed by their parents and perhaps work an evening in the pub for a little extra money.

I suspect the parents are finding the tuition fees eat up a lot of the money they had set aside so that little extra money is more important than you think, and there are a lot more people who aren't funded by mummy and daddy than there used to be.

Edit: I've no hard facts though, so if you can be bothered to dig some up that would be interesting.

[Mich the Tester]

Most people have to work part time while studying anyway. That's why the courses are only 10 hours a week.

Do they really? Most of them? OK, a few of them, but I think most students are middle class kids who are largely financed by their parents and perhaps work an evening in the pub for a little extra money.

[TimberWolf]

Would it not be more effective to get more people to start working earlier? Over 65s are likely to need more time for medical care and become less productive. OK, people are working shorter and living longer, so it seems to me that if 50% of young people are going to university and only starting work at 21/22, there’s 4 or 5 years of potential productivity being lost. Why not get more people to start work at 17 or 18 and get their education in the evenings or part time through night school or OU? That way people would be working longer, but in the healthiest and most energetic period of their lives, and the pension age might not need to rise dramatically. All over Europe we have outstanding part time and open education provision, but the standard idea seems to be to stay in full time education for longer and longer and start work later.

Or would bourgeois parents be offended by not being able to boast that young Hamish is 'reading media studies in Sunderland'? He could of course work at Sainsburys and study engineering on the OU. It might take longer for him to graduate, but he'd have plenty of useful experience to go with it.

Just an idea.

WHS.

[doodab]

Or would bourgeois parents be offended by not being able to boast that young Hamish is 'reading media studies in Sunderland'? He could of course work at Sainsburys and study engineering on the OU. It might take longer for him to graduate, but he'd have plenty of useful experience to go with it.

Just an idea.

Most people have to work part time while studying anyway. That's why the courses are only 10 hours a week.

[Gibbon]

FFS we're contractors, why worry about the measly state pension. I'll be retiring at 50 anyway only 7 years to go !

[Mich the Tester]

First of all, this language was invented by Labour, and it has proved to work (evidence: three election victories)

Secondly, raising the state pension age would have been inevitable even without Labour's deficit. The current age was set when the pensionable population was less than half what it is now, so the state is having to find more than twice the money just to stand still. It is barmy.

Would it not be more effective to get more people to start working earlier? Over 65s are likely to need more time for medical care and become less productive. OK, people are working shorter and living longer, so it seems to me that if 50% of young people are going to university and only starting work at 21/22, there’s 4 or 5 years of potential productivity being lost. Why not get more people to start work at 17 or 18 and get their education in the evenings or part time through night school or OU? That way people would be working longer, but in the healthiest and most energetic period of their lives, and the pension age might not need to rise dramatically. All over Europe we have outstanding part time and open education provision, but the standard idea seems to be to stay in full time education for longer and longer and start work later.

Or would bourgeois parents be offended by not being able to boast that young Hamish is 'reading media studies in Sunderland'? He could of course work at Sainsburys and study engineering on the OU. It might take longer for him to graduate, but he'd have plenty of useful experience to go with it.

Just an idea.

[Doggy Styles]

Eh ??

This is one of the more stupid soundbites I've heard come out of Clegg's mouth or backside (I forget which) recently.

First of all, this language was invented by Labour, and it has proved to work (evidence: three election victories)

Secondly, raising the state pension age would have been inevitable even without Labour's deficit. The current age was set when the pensionable population was less than half what it is now, so the state is having to find more than twice the money just to stand still. It is barmy.

[Churchill]

A tax rise by any other name - and a massive one at that.

A direct consequence of the mess that Labour left us in. It might be a bitter pill to swallow but don't forget who gave us the Flu in the first place!

Socialism is a disease!

[Lockhouse]

A tax rise by any other name - and a massive one at that.

[Churchill]

By the sound of it retirement will come to mean keeling over and dying.

Yeah but just think of the annuity rates!

[doodab]

By the sound of it retirement will come to mean keeling over and dying.

[moorfield]

Eh ??

This is one of the more stupid soundbites I've heard come out of Clegg's mouth or backside (I forget which) recently.